Tryst with destiny -- free but divided

New Delhi,
Tue, 14 Aug 2007Binita Tiwari

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"Long years ago we made a tryst with destiny, and now the time comes when we will redeem our pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but very substantially. At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance.... We end today a period of ill fortune, and India discovers herself again."(Famous speech Tryst with Destiny by Jawaharlal Nehru, on the eve of First Independence Day).

Yes they passed the baton of their darling hope and dream to us believing that we will run and make India into the one which they have dreamt of.

They died to ensure our future so that we can see our tomorrow….

They gave us constitution so that we will be aware of our right as well as others….

Looking back into the past 60 years ….we get a sulky picture of uniting and dividing India….

India united at war or at cricket matches against Pakistan…Other than this India remains divided….

India remains divided at Godhra instance where not only people were killed but their faith also got murdered, India was communally divided.

India remains divided at recent killing of Hindi speaking people in Assam. Every year the labourers from Bihar get killed on the name of plundering their resource and culture. Stop for a moment! Have we ever looked what they have offered….they build our houses and road so that we can take the path to civilizations.

Who will speak on their behalf? No one!! As they look dirty…as they do not have a say…as they are not empowered.

Our constitution gave us right to settle and move any part of India with reasonable restriction imposed by state. Last year Maharashtra asks for full reservation of jobs to local people in the state….Is this the reasonable restriction the constitution has talked about?

Millions died irrespective of caste and religion in India’s freedom to struggle……How will we divide their participation????How will we divide the time???

Slavery has not disappeared for a moment, earlier we were slave at the hand of British imperialism now under corruption, bribery and red tepism.

The states like Jammu &Kashmir in spite of special right of having their own constitution and freedom to move and settle anywhere in India, cannot identify themselves with India. Kashmiri pundits are devoid of their home in their home state.

North East people consider themselves as foreigner, and even if they come to join other part of India they are ridiculed for their ethnic differences.

Bihari has become a national “Gali” as it represents the most backward region of our country, as the tone they speak is different….But at the cost of Bihar other state developed and went ahead. Land reforms, Ranvir Sena and Naxalism, flood; illiteracy is the fate of the state.

West Bengal and Orissa suffered because of Singur and Kalinganagar respectively, as government conspired to snatch the land of poor in the name of industrialization. Apart from drought and flood mar their life…

Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, which boast of doing well…let its farmer died of starvation and suicide…

Nithari case of paedophile and necrophagy added shame to our country then the carcasses of hundreds of female fetuses in various part of country especially in state like Delhi and Haryana blotted the concept of education and its utility.

Institutionalized and systematic proliferation of manual scavenging, caste system mocks at the abolition of untouchability.

Issues of reservation swept the whole nation as few decades back, questioning the moral of reservation on the basis of caste…as what to those religions which has similar preferred and non preferred group but no caste system????

Give me a single account of a society which boasts of its civilization free from such trivialities?

Gandhi in his famous speech for Quit India Movement ……….“I believe that in the history of the world, there has not been a more genuinely democratic struggle for freedom than ours. I read Carlyle's French Resolution while I was in prison, and Pandit Jawaharlal has told me something about the Russian revolution. But it is my conviction that inasmuch as these struggles were fought with the weapon of violence they failed to realize the democratic ideal. In the democracy which I have envisaged, a democracy established by non-violence, there will be equal freedom for all. Everybody will be his own master. It is to join a struggle for such democracy that I invite you today. Once you realize this you will forget the differences between the Hindus and Muslims, and think of yourselves as Indians only, engaged in the common struggle for independence.”…………………………………………………………We must, therefore, purge ourselves of hatred. Speaking for myself, I can say that I have never felt any hatred. As a matter of fact, I feel myself to be a greater friend of the British now than ever before. One reason is that they are today in distress. My very friendship, therefore, demands that I should try to save them from their mistakes. As I view the situation, they are on the brink of an abyss. It, therefore, becomes my duty to warn them of their danger even though it may, for the time being, anger them to the point of cutting off the friendly hand that is stretched out to help them. People may laugh, nevertheless that is my claim. At a time when I may have to launch the biggest struggle of my life, I may not harbour hatred against anybody……” Showed us path to unite against all odds and not to use hatred against anybody….

True that despite of all these injuries India is shining …..But till when we will survive the whirlpool of emotions?? Till when we will carry the burden of hunger and corrupted politicians…Till when we will play with the millions of unborne future?? Can’t these acts of shame be shrugged..??

ITS HIGH TIME.. IF WE DONT REALISE THESE BURNING ISSUES and the growing REGIONALISM, CASTEISM, GROUPISM, ETC it would engulf all of us....... each one of suffer with atleast one of the above problem in day today life.. STILL WE BECOME A PART OF one of the issues indirectly or directly... so Lets ARISE AWAKE AND TRANSFORM our attitude and the next generation....Rinky Gupta, IGIB, Delhi.